Absinthe-minded

Green is the new blackout

By Robert Jacobs

Special to Metromix
May 5, 2008

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It was around midnight when I realized there might actually be something to the whole absinthe thing. We stood in the middle of my friend’s backyard, marveling at the crisp long shadows we cast across his wide blue lawn. I looked up at the night sky. The moon was a klieg light, and the stars looked like floating magnesium signal flares. Everything was cast in a weird lunar glow, with a tinge of green, as if the trees were leaking chlorophyll. Staring at the night sky I had the sudden overwhelming sense that I had seen this sky before—this exact sky—but where? Then it came to me—it was a painting by that one-eared punk Van Gogh: "The Starry Night." Ah, now it all makes sense—Van Gogh was a notorious absinthe drinker, a fiend even. When he couldn’t get his hands on absinthe, he would drink paint thinner. We shall refrain, for the moment at least, from drinking paint thinner, but absinthe—the Green Goddess, muse of poets, painters and writers everywhere—absinthe, we shall pursue.

Half the beauty of drinking absinthe is in the ritual. The first thing you need is a bottle. Absinthe has only recently regained its legal status (after a hiatus of nearly 100 years), so it’s slowly making its way back into liquor stores. There are two brands currently available in the States—a French absinthe called Lucid and a Swiss version named Kubler. They’re both high quality absinthe, and cost approximately $50. We went with Lucid, because we liked the way the bottle looked. In addition to the bottle, you’ll need a box of sugar cubes, a pitcher of ice water, a cocktail glass and something like a slotted spoon.

To start, pour a jigger (1.5 oz.) of absinthe in the glass. Then, put a sugar cube on the slotted spoon and place the spoon across the rim of the glass. Now, pour the ice water very slowly and gently over the sugar cube so that the cube melts and the cold water gradually dribbles into the absinthe. We used roughly a 3:1 ratio water to absinthe, but you can adjust to taste. You’ll notice the absinthe gradually turns milky. This milky effect is called the louche (pronounced loosh), and is the result of certain elements' (fennel and anise) insolubility in water. This is a good thing; it allows the subtle flavors and fragrances of the absinthe to "bloom." For a more theatrical effect, soak the sugar cube in the absinthe and then place it on the spoon and set it on fire.

Finally—and this is the best part—drink it! Drink it slowly. Enjoy it. Savor it. Appreciate the long history of decadence, unadulterated depravity and luminescent art attached to this beautiful green bitch. Hemingway called it liquid alchemy; and Rimbaud wrote "Knowing pilgrims, seek repose/By the emerald pillars of absinthe."

Absinthe is famous for supposedly causing hallucinations. If, by hallucinations, the rumors imply that something like hairy, demonic, winged frogs will descend from the clouds, then we did not hallucinate. There is definitely something going on with absinthe, though—something more than just alcohol.

After several drinks, I noticed a very interesting and pleasant feeling—I felt the warm, euphoric glow of drunkenness, but without the attendant degradation of mind. On the contrary, I felt energized and clear; I felt relaxed, but focused; I felt...LUCID! My friend Brian reported the exact same effects. We decided the only rational thing to do was to drink more—for the sake of journalism and the experiment, of course. The weird thing is that the more we drank the more lucid we became. Make no mistake, I was drunk; but it was like part of my mind became ultra-clear. My brain arranged itself into a radiant pyramid of exquisite jewels: Every brain cell a diamond, every neural network an Alpine stream.

We drank into the night, and killed the whole bottle. Lucid is 124 proof. If I had drunk a bottle of 124 proof whisky, I would have been crawling on the ground eating dirt. Instead, I conversed coherently with interesting and intelligent people about the possibility of existing in a hyper-dimensional universe. I will be going to the Wine Source in Hampden in the very near future. I need to try the Kubler next.